This sentence, a quote from Kathleen Norris, who writes movingly in many books of grappling with perfectionism and her spiritual journey, was to be the title of one of the sections in my upcoming memoir, I Am Not A Juvenile Delinquent, about my similar struggles. But I had to cut it when my editor suggested that three sections would work better than the five I’d originally had. As usual, she was correct.

But its personal resonance has never left me; this morning during a very challenging zoom yoga class with a new teacher, its noisy dictates blared back to me as I struggled to get the unfamiliar poses exactly right.